Former President Yoon Suk-yeol's prison sentence has been finalized on charges including obstructing an arrest attempt by the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO). The ruling comes 583 days after his Dec. 3 declaration of emergency martial law. It is the first Supreme Court ruling among Yoon's multiple trials. The verdict was broadcast live. However, Yoon did not appear in court, as defendants are not required to attend Supreme Court proceedings.
The Supreme Court's Third Division (presiding Justice Lee Suk-yeon) at 2 p.m. Thursday upheld the lower court's ruling sentencing Yoon to seven years in prison on charges including special obstruction of official duties and abuse of power to obstruct the exercise of rights.
Yoon was indicted in July last year by the special counsel team investigating the insurrection on charges of mobilizing Presidential Security Service personnel in January last year, during the early stage of the Dec. 3 martial law investigation, to block the CIO's execution of an arrest warrant. He was also charged with violating the martial law deliberation rights of nine Cabinet members by convening only some ministers to create the mere appearance of a Cabinet meeting before declaring martial law. He additionally faced charges of creating a false declaration document after martial law was lifted—making it appear that martial law had been carried out based on a document countersigned by former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo and former Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun—and subsequently destroying it.
The first trial found him guilty of charges including obstructing the arrest and sentenced him to five years in prison.
The appeals court sentenced him to seven years. That was heavier than the first-instance sentence, but less than the 10 years sought by the special counsel team. The appeals court found Yoon guilty on all charges of blocking the CIO's execution of the arrest warrant and of violating the deliberation rights of the nine Cabinet members who were excluded when only some ministers were convened to create the appearance of a Cabinet meeting at the time of the martial law declaration. It also overturned the first trial's acquittal and found him guilty of ordering the dissemination of press guidance (PG) to foreign media containing the false claim that he "had not the slightest intention of destroying the constitutional order." The court also found him guilty of creating the false declaration document after martial law was lifted (fabricating a false official document) and subsequently destroying it (violation of the Presidential Records Act and destruction of public documents). However, it acquitted him of the charge of using the false official document, in line with the first trial.
Meanwhile, the main case related to the emergency martial law—the charge of leading an insurrection—is undergoing its second trial before the Seoul High Court's dedicated insurrection bench. The first trial sentenced Yoon to life imprisonment on the charge of leading an insurrection. Yoon also received a 30-year prison sentence in the first trial on charges including general benefiting of the enemy over the "Pyongyang drone infiltration." He was acquitted in the first trial of perjury charges related to his testimony in former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo's trial, while four other criminal trials are either awaiting first-instance verdicts this month or still under deliberation.
